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Cisco Shares Fall After Topping Q1 EPS Estimates

Cisco Systems' (NASDAQ: CSCO) first quarter EPS came in at $0.53 versus the Street estimate of $0.51, beating by $0.02.

Earnings per share were up 10 percent from the year-ago period.

Revenue arrived at $12.1 billion, a little lower than the $12.36 billion that Wall Street expected.

Sales were up two percent year-over-year.

Regardless, investors are unhappy. Cisco closed the day with a 1.12 increase but is currently down in after hours trading, falling more than three percent.

"This quarter we delivered record non-GAAP profitability and continued our steady stream of innovation and market leadership," Cisco Chairman and CEO John Chambers said in a company release. "While our revenue growth was below our expectation, our financials are strong, our strategy is strong and our innovation engine is executing extremely well. We remain confident in our long-term goal to be the #1 IT company in the world and help our customers solve their biggest business problems."

"We delivered solid profitability in the quarter and are focused on capitalizing on our strategic opportunities," said Frank Calderoni, Cisco Executive VP and Chief Financial Officer, who was also quoted in the company release. "We are committed to our capital allocation strategy as we demonstrated today with the $15 billion increase in the authorization of our stock repurchase program."

The company also announced that it was adding $15 billion to its stock repurchase program.

UPDATE: On the company's conference call, some concerning guidance was issued, sending the stock lower. The company is expecting second-quarter sales to decline in the range of 8-10 percent. Earnings are expected to be in the range of $0.45 to $0.47, below the current analyst consensus estimate of $0.52.

Disclosure: At the time of this writing, Louis Bedigian had no position in the equities mentioned in this report.

Louis Bedigian is the Senior Tech Analyst and Features Writer of Benzinga. You can reach him at louis(at)benzingapro(dot)com. Follow him @LouisBedigianBZ